How Hollywood plans to keep prices up as movies go online - <AUTHOR> http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/12/hollywoods-plan-to-keep-prices-high-as-movies-go-digitaland-why-it-just-might-work.ars <comment><USER2> I have Netflix. For movies that are available on BluRay, I love getting the disc, but for the rest I use Netflix' PS3 streaming service.

I probably watch on average one movie a day.

<comment><USER3> You have the time to watch a full length movie every day?

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> For me the biggest part of the price of watching a movie is my time. There isn't much room for additional physical dollars that I'm willing to put into the experience. I cannot even remember the last time a movie was worthy of (my time + ticket/rental price.)

<comment><USER5> Gosh, you must be a rather depressing person to be around. I'm imagining a friend telling you about a funny anecdote and then you interrupt them by giving a stern look and pointing to your wristwatch.

<comment><USER6> I guess you're also imagining him having paid his friend $8-$12 before his friend started telling the anecdote?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The whole rental business reminds me of some conversations I've had with friends trying to explain how the first-sale doctrine (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine>) increases the value of the books, movies, and games that they buy, and for that reason the digital versions which cannot be transferred should be sold cheaper, where they argue that since the experience is roughly the same the cost should be.

Basically, since you have the right to resell a book, DVD or CD that you buy to the used store, a friend, or a yard sale, that copy is worth more. That value is included in the retail price. Would you be willing to pay as much for a car if you could _never_ resell it not matter how good the condition was?

As an example, take that movie you only end up watching once, the DVD and the digital download cost $20. If you get the digital download you would watch it once and that would be it, it would sit on your hard drive until you deleted it and then just be a database record on some server somewhere. If you bought a physical copy, you could sell that copy, say for 50%, to a friend who was thinking about buying it, or to at a flea market or the like. The net result is that the digital copy costs $20 and the physical copy costs $10. Which is the better deal? Sounds to me like the digital copy should only cost $10.

Of course, most people don't resell their movies, games or books and end up with selves storing a bunch of items they don't need and don't plan to use again. But that's another rant.

</comment><comment><USER8> They've missed the boat, by several years.

All (new)movies are online at a price of zero (not counting risk of being convicted for copyright infringement).

Legally, more movies are online at a cost of greencine or netflix account. There's also Hulu and the like.

</comment><comment><USER9> The movie industry should just get together, and create a content streaming box like Netflix.

Then on movie release date, you'd get a popup, that so and so movie came out, gives you a 3 minute preview, then prompts you to watch it for $39.99

Movie industry doesn't have to pay a dime to theaters, people don't have to pay the money for overpriced popcorn, and everyone wins.

\+ there is the incentive for people to buy the movie to be able to talk about it at the water cooler on Monday. Could make it a cultural thing, make it the thing to do, to watch the movie on release weekend.

And for piracy, there is no reason to do it, since you are offering much higher quality offering, and are making it easy for people to watch your movie.

<comment><USER10> $40? That's... way, way, WAY out of the range most people would pay to watch a movie as individuals. You would have to assume at least five people watching a movie in front of the same TV before you get any relative benefit whatsoever from the purchase.

<comment><USER9> find how about $19.99? And on top of the movie you get all that extra stuff they add to DVDs?

<comment><USER11> Where do you live? I didn't know there was a place where a DVD rental costs $20. Market rates now are about $1 for Redbox or a video store, up to $5 from your cable company on demand.

<comment><USER12> People do pay more to see a movie in some cases though. Either they pay $20 to see it in a theater (including overpriced popcorn and soda), or they purchase the dvd.

<comment><USER13> People don't think of it as "I paid $20 to see it in the theatre," though. I know that everyone I talk to says, "Let's go to $5 movie night," even though with popcorn and drink it's more like $12.

<comment><USER11> Also we're not talking about theaters here, which are a value added service. We're talking about watching at home.

<comment><USER12> To some people (those with expensive home theatre setups) theaters are often a value-subtracted service.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


The Problem with Altcoins - <AUTHOR> http://themisescircle.org/blog/2013/08/22/the-problem-with-altcoins/ <comment><USER2> The old objections against altcoins are rolled out and paraded again like a good circus.

Let me paraphrase what author is saying: "There will be no other cryptocurrency, for whatever purpose, ever, than bitcoin."

That's of course complete bunk. Yes, most of the existing altcoins are doomed, because they don't add anything of value. The few that do add something unique, are as likely as not to see these features adopted into bitcoin itself.

However there are areas where an altcoin can succeed, under the following conditions:

\- If it adds something unique

\- If what it adds is useful and liked by people

\- If what it adds cannot be incorporated into bitcoin

Wait, how can it be that something can't be incorporated into bitcoin? Well, bitcoin has a certain architecture, which makes some ideas more easy to incorporate, and others hard, or impossible. A few examples of things that would have a difficult time landing in bitcoin:

\- Colored coins

\- Blockchain based trade order execution (would also be predicated on colored coins).

\- Domain name resolution

\- Trust metrics

\- Arbitration and reversable transactions

There's many more. But you get the idea, most of these things are not inherently compatible with how bitcoin works, and is liked by people for working in this fashion. That doesn't make this bad ideas, it just makes them ideas where supplemental systems can excel.

<comment><AUTHOR> I submitted this because I wanted to see it discussed in this light. I think the author makes some good points but others are just plain wrong. For example, when it is said that Litecoin and other Scrypt-based coins were created just as a way not to let GPU mining rigs go worthless: I believe the existence of other coins with different algorithms is important, even to point out possible flaws in Bitcoin and the way SHA-256 is used.

Altcoins, among other things, provide a way for testing (sometimes crazy) ideas that can't be tested on Bitcoin at this stage, and allow for more choices to be given to the user (in the same way Linux is not the only open source kernel, GNU GPL is not the only open source license, etc.).

If you think of Bitcoin as just another open source project, and consider "altcoins" to be forks, you'll find forks that are basically just copies of the main project with some values adjusted to the will of the creator, and you'll find more elaborate forks that actually add something new (even if these additions prove to be inadequate to merge into the main project at some point). The second type of forks is, in my opinion, very desirable, while the first one is pretty much useless and, sometimes, is nothing more than a pump- and-dump scheme.

<comment><USER3> _I believe the existence of other coins with different algorithms is important, even to point out possible flaws in Bitcoin and the way SHA-256 is used._

But Litecoin hasn't pointed out any flaws in Bitcoin, so it's pointless in that respect. It even introduced new flaws like claiming to be GPU-hard even though it wasn't.

Also, when a flaw in Bitcoin is discovered, attempting to fork the Bitcoin economy by deploying an altcoin is a very expensive and disruptive way to fix it. But it's par for the course in a world where you disclose security holes by stealing people's money.

<comment><USER4> >It even introduced new flaws like claiming to be GPU-hard even though it wasn't.

You think that's a flaw? It's a claim you idiot, and it was bound to happen, just as PoW in Bitmessage was moved to the GPU by spammers so they could flood the network. I can't think of one alt coin that hasn't been mined by GPUs

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Very disappointed with the discussion here. The author makes many good points deconstructing the claims made by creators of many of the altcoins. His main argument is that none of the altcoins improve on Bitcoin in any significant way, and most of these altcoins (specifically the Scrypt-coins) were probably created out of greed. Many people who invested in GPU-mining rigs were looking for something like Litecoin to take off and make their massive investments worthwhile.

I think the author is dead on. These altcoins don't improve on bitcoin, and are all orders of magnitude less valuable as money.

<comment><USER4> I have to strongly disagree and I think the author has gotten it wrong. There have been quite innovative alt coins in this first wave, the most prominent ones being Namecoin, Litecoin, Peercoin, Primecoin, Freicoin and possibly Anoncoin as they have all found niches that they can cater to. Litecoin has the second largest market cap and has the honour of being the first major Scrypt coin Peercoin has the third largest cap, it introduced Proof of Stake as an alternative for Proof of Work and in the latest round of alt coin investment it did the best in terms of market cap increase to coins ratio. Namecoin has a niche as a alt DNS Primecoin allows Proof of Work to be useful rather than selfish to the network as is the case with Bitcoin Anoncoin recently integrated i2p and Zerocoin to provide greater anonymity for users Freicoin had a great idea with demurrage, very capitalist, but it failed because people want a currency that's either going to hold or appreciate in value and also because 80% of the funds were held by the Freicoin foundation rather than the community.

There's also a second wave of altcoins coming, ones not based on Satoshi's algorithms. The best example would be eMunie, which from what I hear is very close to release.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Interesting to see this at a Mises-related blog. I'm not deeply into Austrian economics, but I was under the impression that Austrians didn't think much of either Bitcoin _or_ other cryptocurrency alternatives. Aren't all cryptocurrencies at fundamental odds with Ludwig von Mises's "regression theorem" [1], which posits that legitimate currencies can only originate "naturally" as an outgrowth of real commodity trade, and cannot be artificially constructed _as_ currencies?

[1] [http://books.google.com/books?id=xFsaVHBXlNkC&pg=PA61&dq=%22...](http://books.google.com/books?id=xFsaVHBXlNkC&pg=PA61&dq=%22regression+theorem%22)

<comment><USER7> You should check out one of my other articles, The Original Value of Bitcoins, which explains the relationship of Bitcoin to the regression theorem. [http://themisescircle.org/blog/2013/07/02/the-original- value...](http://themisescircle.org/blog/2013/07/02/the-original-value-of- bitcoins/) There is also relevant work done by Peter Surda [http://dev.economicsofbitcoin.com/mastersthesis/mastersthesi...](http://dev.economicsofbitcoin.com/mastersthesis/mastersthesis- surda-2012-11-19b.pdf) and Konrad Graf, whose work is definitive, but significantly longer. [http://konradsgraf.com/blog1/2013/11/3/expanded-on-the- origi...](http://konradsgraf.com/blog1/2013/11/3/expanded-on-the-origins-of- bitcoin-paper-with-empirical-supp.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER8> I'd argue that Altcoins can definitely become a store of value regardless of Bitcoins network effect.

Check out [http://ripple.com](http://ripple.com) \- they pretty much solve this problem, although its VERY beta. Expect really cool things from them in ~6 months.

Ripple is fiat agnostic and allows seamless conversion between currencies. This means I can buy something in Yen and you can receive payment in LTC. Amazing system if it gets up and running.

<comment><USER9> Ripple is a premined, centralized system. You have to depend on the creators benevolence for coins.

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I agree with most of the problems listed here; but am just as certain of there being long-term viability for alt-coins as I was of bitcoin several years ago.

I am surprised though that the author did not make, what to me, is the most obvious and strong argument for or against alt-coins, namely; `there can only be one--per hashing algorithm`.

The problem with alt-coins that share bitcoin's mining algorithm is that they are inherently insecure; as bitcoin's hashing power can be used to 51% attack the alt-coins directly; which is inevitable if the alt-coin is profitable to mine, or if it threatens bitcoin's dominance.

Consider an alt-coin that is less profitable than bitcoin to mine; people won't mine it. Consider again an alt-coin that is more profitable than bitcoin to mine; miners will hash the alt-coin until it is less profitable (profitablility is a direct correlation between hashing power and price-per- coin; as more hashing power chases a static amount of coins, profitability drops)--this dooms any alt-coin that both shares a hashing algorithm with a more established crypto-coin and does not solve any fatal flaw.

For this reason, I think litecoin will have long term success; while feathercoin (et al) are doomed; bitcoin hashing power cannot be pointed at litecoin. Total network hashing power is very analogous to mass and gravity; like draws like in this regard, the more hashing power pointed at a block- chain, the more secure it is, the more peopel trust it, the value it will have, the more people will mine it.

There is room for infinite crypto-coins, despite the authors hand-waviness around bitcoin competing "with the dollar and paypal"; fiat currencies have shown (to the most freshman of history buffs) to be exploited for the benefit of the elite at the expense o the masses; something a well-designed cryptocoin (bitcoin included) cannot be subject to. People will choose to use cryptocoins as their benefits become more viscerally tangible; and competing blockchains will forever come in and out; and some will stay.

But, if you ever want to bootstrap your _own_ blockchain; you must use a new hashing algorithm or it is doomed.

</comment><comment><USER11> PPCoin gives you the new concept of proof of stake and it introduces monetary policy where the production of new currency is tied to how much hoarding is going on.I f it ever takes off it will probably be more stable than BitCoin. That alone could make it ultimately more attractive than BitCoin to mainstream traders and users. BitCoin is a truly libertarian coin with no monetary policy and nothing to get in the way of deflation.

People are going to have a hard time converting their fiat dollars into a currency that changes value by +/\- $150 every week.

</comment><comment><USER12> Given the relatively small overall market cap and even smaller circulation of bitcoin, if McDonald's decided to issue change in "McCoin" it would probably take days for that to surpass bitcoin in the metrics on which his arguments rest.

Corporation branded crypto credit... Sounds like something from the future.

<comment><USER13> This is closer than it seems -- every xmas I get a ton of gift cards to places that I don't want to go to, and then I have to spend over that amount or else leave money on the table. It feels like an Applebee's currency already.

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> He ignores a key goal of proof-of-work, which is to get consensus without burning all those cpu cycles. If it works out it could be much more energy- efficient.

Another new idea with a similar goal is proof-of-burn: [https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Proof_of_burn](https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Proof_of_burn)

Scalability is another goal of some alt-coin ideas. The finite blockchain idea is one example that couldn't be simply layered onto Bitcoin itself. Here's a paper (pdf): [http://www.bitfreak.info/files/pp2p-ccmbc- rev1.pdf](http://www.bitfreak.info/files/pp2p-ccmbc-rev1.pdf)

<comment><USER14> Wish I could edit: in first paragraph I mean proof-of-stake.

</comment></comment><comment><USER15> I think the author is overestimating the weight of bitcoin's network. It would only take a really major player to back any of the altcoins to kill bitcoin

<comment><USER7> Why would a major player back an altcoin? The whole point of my article is that the largest network is the most viable, and so the most logical cryptocoin for any major player to back would be Bitcoin.

<comment><USER3> Arguably a major player could back _their own_ altcoin that is somehow rigged to favor them (e.g. premining), but I have no idea if such a scenario would actually work.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Altcoins could be made more valuable if a) they performed some function that Bitcoin cannot feasibly perform, and b) if some type of atomic inter- cryptocurrency trade protocol could be produced which would allow low-friction trade between cryptocurrencies, and without the use of centralized exchanges.

<comment><USER8> Agreed.

b) is ripple (I already commented about it in this thread) - it really is amazing technology that I hope becomes mainstream. It solves a lot of the major problems of BTC and other Altcoins.

<comment><USER17> Isn't Ripple centralized though?

<comment><USER18> No, the ripple protocol and ledger are decentralized. The aspects which are more "centralized" than bitcoin are the XRP distribution scheme (with OpenCoin/Ripple Labs initially owning 100%), and that ledger consensus relies on a hardcoded list of validator nodes (unique node list aka UNL), rather than proof-of-work.

Redemption of IOUs is still a centralized process - you can only redeem IOUs through the issuing gateway. So the difference on ripple is that the order book for trading the IOU is decentralized, and the IOUs can freely circulate. For example, you can't send mtgox USD to another mtgox user (this used to be possible, but mtgox removed their "mtgox codes" feature). But you can do this on bitstamp, because bitstamp is a ripple gateway that issues USD IOUs.

<comment><USER19> No, the Ripple ledger is not decentralized in any meaningful way. The ledger consensus is entirely decided on by a cluster of nodes explicitly approved by OpenCoin Inc (and in many cases run by them too). There is no way for any non- approved node to influence their ledger consensus; all non-OpenCoin nodes can do is double-check the ledger agreed on by the OpenCoin nodes.

In practice this means that they can freeze arbitrary coins and accounts and there's nothing anyone can do about it. What's more, unlike in Bitcoin it has protocol-mandated fees that are effectively paid to OpenCoin Inc (they have to be paid using XRP which is then destroyed, and the only source of new XRP is OpenCoin Inc) - and those fees are set as part of the ledger consensus. So if it takes off they can ramp up the fees they charge to use Ripple arbitrarily and no-one can do anything about it.

<comment><USER18> Anyone can run a validator node, and you have total control over your own UNL (usually published as ripple.txt). It is true that the current network of validator nodes isn't very diverse, but rippled has only been open source a couple of months. That will change as more gateways come online (e.g. the xrptalk validator node has snapswap in its UNL, as you can see [https://xrptalk.org/ripple.txt](https://xrptalk.org/ripple.txt)).

OpenCoin/Ripple Labs can't steal funds at any account (unless they have the private keys to that account). They could attempt to freeze an arbitrary account by ignoring any broadcasted transactions associated with that account, and only voting on candidate sets which don't include them. But that would be noticeable, as the transactions would get stuck in the candidate sets of all the honest nodes. If there are enough honest nodes with overlapping UNL's, then the Ripple Labs nodes would have to accept it, or be split/forked from the network.

The paid transaction fees are destroyed, so they are effectively paid to all XRP holders, in proportion to their holdings. This is actually similar to the proof-of-stake scheme in ppcoin.

Also, the base fee gets changed by upgrading rippled. There is a pseudo- transaction associated with changing the base fee and the minimum reserve, but these pseudo-transactions are used to prevent the network from agreeing to a fee change (or implementation of new features) until enough validator nodes have the upgraded ripple (upgraded nodes will "vote" on the fee change).

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> Strongly disagree.

[http://bitcoinmagazine.com/6926/in-defense-of-alternative- cr...](http://bitcoinmagazine.com/6926/in-defense-of-alternative- cryptocurrencies/)

</comment><comment><USER21> Network effects make competition pointless ... um ... while it's very much apples to oranges, people said that about MySpace too.

 _hands out pinches of salt_

</comment><comment><USER22> TLDR: Altcoins won't be successful because Bitcoin is successful!

</comment><comment><USER23> Litecoin is at a respectable $3, that's not too shabby?

<comment><USER24> That proves only that a sucker is willing to pay $3 for it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> The first altcoin to utilize and implement M-of-N-signatures will take over. Bitcoin is close but not quite.

<comment><USER26> Bitcoin has M-of-N, it's just turned off.

<comment><USER24> It's always been enabled, just not relayed (but if you get it in a block, it's valid). But for the last year it's been relay-enabled as well.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> What a bullshit article. Many altcoins already succeeded:

[http://coinmarketcap.com/](http://coinmarketcap.com/)

<comment><USER28> Given only 3 have an entire network value of greater than $10M, I'm not sure I would agree with "succeeded". More to the point, outside of BTC and maybe LTC, I don't believe there are many (any?) merchants accepting them for transactions.

</comment></comment><comment><USER29> The problem with Altcoins is that they prove to be a perceivable threat to Bitcoin true believers and the perceived long-term value of their holdings.</comment>


Superconducting secrets solved after 30 years - <AUTHOR> http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/superconducting-secrets-solved-after-30-years

<comment><USER2> Strange age: dozens of breakthroughs, yet no practical outcomes. Still waiting for fuel cells in mobile devices.

</comment><comment><USER3> Url changed from [http://www.iflscience.com/chemistry/scientists-finally- unloc...](http://www.iflscience.com/chemistry/scientists-finally-unlock- secrets-behind-superconductivity), which points to this.</comment>


Extracting timestamp and MAC address from UUIDs - <AUTHOR> http://rpbouman.blogspot.com/2014/06/mysql-extracting-timstamp-and-mac.html

<comment><USER2> There's a story that the creator of 1999's "Melissa" virus was found via a GUID in the Word document that included their MAC address.

(I'm having trouble confirming the veracity of this, since the web is full of citogenesis that links to [http://www.zdnet.com/news/tracking-melissas-alter- egos/10197...](http://www.zdnet.com/news/tracking-melissas-alter-egos/101974) which isn't super clear, but it's a good story nonetheless.)

</comment><comment><USER3> An alternative that was posted here a week or so ago: [https://eager.io/blog/how-long-does-an-id-need-to- be/](https://eager.io/blog/how-long-does-an-id-need-to-be/)

<comment><USER4> Or you could just use type 4 UUIDs. We know 64 bits is likely too small, and 128 bits is likely enough. Why bother saving a few bits here and there, if you already have a working solution?

<comment><USER5> For unique IDs in databases, you want them to have common prefixes such that they are kept in rough time order in the database's backend, otherwise your indexes can end up huge and degrade performance (especially in MySQL, that's where we got bitten by it). That's where Type 1s are great, but of course this article shows a major downside.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> We encountered some of these same issues and wrote this library to mitigate them: [https://github.com/groupon/locality- uuid.java](https://github.com/groupon/locality-uuid.java). I think UUIDs make good unique ids overall, particularly in distributed environments where id generation can't be coordinated, but should be used carefully, as the article notes.

<comment> X-Istence Why not just use UUID 4:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universally_unique_identifier#V...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universally_unique_identifier#Version_4_.28random.29)

This will have an better distribution for when they are used as keys as well.

<comment><USER7> As far as I can tell, neither MySQL, nor MariaDB has a function for generating type 4 UUIDs. It's of course possible to generate the UUIDs on the client side, but then it's not really an alternative to auto-incrementing surrogate keys.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> Why tapping on any text will navigate to another page? I've seen the same before, on blogs using the same theme. Is that to increase hits? It's really annoying for the reader experience!

<comment><USER9> That theme has a slide-to-next/prev-post feature. Tapping shouldn't activate it but maybe it's buggy with some browsers. Opera Android doesn't (same engine of Chrome).</comment></comment>


White House Might Put Colleges on the Hook for Student Loans - <AUTHOR> https://www.wsj.com/articles/white-house-might-put-colleges-on-the-hook-for-student-loans-11552406110 <comment><USER2> The system of government-backed loans, that cannot be forgiven through bankruptcy, given to anyone under the sun, has fallen victim to the Law of Unintended Consequences.

Vastly increasing the supply of money that can be paid to the Higher Education System has, surprise surprise, greatly increased the cost of a degree. Entire swaths of for-profit education institutions have popped up, ready to drink from the ever-full FAFSA/Pell/etc trough.

The possibility of putting yourself through a great college is lunacy now a days. You need to start saving as soon as you graduate to be able to pay for your child's education.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is long overdue. Many college programs have gotten really bloated and over-priced. Students are often saddled with debt they can never pay off because the degrees are not providing skills that employers are looking for. This is not perfect, but a step in the right direction.

</comment><comment><USER4> Please stop subsidizing these institutions. The US backed loan system for ever-climbing tuitions are an obvious cartel. Never mind the uselessness and lack of ROI of most degrees in the broader job market.

<comment><USER5> >Never mind the uselessness and lack of ROI of most degrees in the broader job market.

AFAIK the reason why this is even an issue is because the government guarantees all loans equally (probably "study what you love" is politically popular). If there were no government guarantees, lenders wouldn't lend to students studying for useless degrees (presumably because they have a higher default risk).

<comment><USER6> > lenders wouldn't lend to students studying for useless degrees

And why is that a bad thing?

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> > Colleges and universities argue that, should such a measure be implemented, > it would harm schools that take on disproportionate numbers of low-income > students, like historically black colleges and universities and for-profit > schools.

This strikes me as bizarre. This is supposed to be a protection for the student, not the school. If schools are failing their students, they should be held accountable, especially for low income students. If someone gets into a school, takes on loans and drops out, the college didn't do the student any favors

<comment><USER8> It's almost like their admitting they wouldn't give out loans to low-income students.

</comment></comment><comment><USER9> Serious question: Why not just remove the government guaranteed part of the loans? This seems backwards to me.

<comment><USER10> Students would not qualify for loans if they were not guaranteed by the government. They are young people with little or no income or collateral -- who would be willing to lend them tens of thousands of dollars?

If you remove the government backing you might as well just not bother having student loans at all.

<comment><USER11> There are young people who should not be in college. They either don't have the aptitude, or they weren't serious in high school and aren't prepared. We should not be guaranteeing loans for these kids, nor making them at all in most cases.

A young person with no income but good academics and a plan to study something with good employment prospects would still be a good candidate for at least some amount of credit.

Another side effect would be that with a drop in people going to college, employers would be forced to drop the "college degree required" from the vast number of jobs that really do not require a college education of any kind.

<comment><USER10> > A young person with no income but good academics and a plan to study > something with good employment prospects would still be a good candidate for > at least some amount of credit.

That's not what would happen. What would happen is that rich kids would get to go to college no matter how prepared they were or what major they chose, and poor kids who prepared well and chose useful majors would not be able to afford it.

<comment><USER11> Poor kids used to be able to work in the summer and maybe part-time during the school year to pay for college, until easy loans inflated the cost so much that became impossible

<comment><USER10> Loans did not create the affordability crisis. Decreased government funding for higher education did that.

Look at any first-world country that has kept college education affordable and you will see that they are essentially propping it up as a social welfare program, capping tuition, and giving universities tons of money. No country has kept college education affordable through any other method.

That's also the way it used to work at state universities in the United States, and that's why kids were able to work summer jobs to cover tuition.

If you take away the loans without also significantly increasing funding for higher education, college will not become affordable again.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> When I went to college, I thought the textbooks racket was the biggest ripoff I'd ever seen. (New books every year, all at eye-popping prices.)

But loans have far surpassed that. It's like the colleges are shopping malls, and the government gives every shopper a new Visa card when they walk up to the door. The store owners are overjoyed. The people who pay for the card later, not so much.

</comment><comment><USER13> [https://outline.com/aS3LJK](https://outline.com/aS3LJK)</comment>


Why You Should Never Sleep with a VC on the First Date - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/@lilibalfour/why-you-should-never-sleep-with-a-vc-on-the-first-date-8ab91cab4234#.b8dkatigg <comment><USER2> Wise advice, someone also needs to write an article on why you may not even want to take venture cash at all.</comment>


Choosing PyCharm over Vim/Emacs - <AUTHOR> https://blog.asadjb.com/emacs-were-on-a-break-6b1beffa90d9 <comment><USER2> It's "PyCharm" singular. Difficult to take these kinds of articles seriously when the subject is misspelled.

That said the author is right. Navigation of a new codebase demands powerful navigation features, at which the JetBrains tools are excellent.

<comment><AUTHOR> Sorry for that. Fixed the typo in the title.</comment></comment>


Arwes – Futuristic Sci-Fi and Cyberpunk GUI Framework for Web Apps - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/arwes/arwes <comment><USER2> This is amazingly cool. I could definitely see using this on a project soon!</comment>


CureCRM launches email-powered CRM within Outlook 2007 - <AUTHOR> http://curecrm.com/blog/2010/mar/18/outlook-2007-plug-and-mobile-iphone-android-window/

<comment><USER2> Ouch. When your app is so slow that it throws the screen-cast presenter off his game, it's _not_ premature optimisation to speed it up a bit.

Or you could, at least, edit the wait out of the video,

<comment><USER3> No kidding - no chance I would use that if, for each email I opened, I would have to wait an additional 2-4 seconds for it to do its thing. And not a very high quality sounding video either - had to turn my volume up to more than half way to hear it and, when I did, it has a poor sound to the voice with a lot of hum.</comment></comment>


Why the Super Bowl made me frown - <AUTHOR> http://restreitinho.com/2012/02/07/why-the-super-bowl-made-me-frown/

<comment><USER2> "Punchline: I expected more this year. I really did. If it takes 54 ads to see one great example of integrated marketing done right… Ouch."

It just goes to show that there is a great learning curve between "established" industry professionals, who have made their livelihoods off of past marketing schemes but now must adapt due to the Great Opening the internet has provided; and the young people of today, who have grown up using the internet and understand a great deal more intuitively about how to appeal to the Facebookers and related ilk. It is all about inclusivity, people! And puppies -- people love puppies! ;D</comment>


Ask HN: How do you use your Twitter favourites? - <AUTHOR>

I've been mulling over an idea for a webapp to help people make better use of their twitter favourites. I use my favourites to save things I want to see later, need to remember to reply to and tweets I find amusing. How do you use your twitter favourites? What features could help you use them in a more effective way? <comment><USER2> I recently started using it as a "like" button. So I don't have to reply with "thanks", "cool" etc ...

</comment><comment><USER3> I personally do not use favourites. I have friends who use them in conjunction with <http://faavorite.com/>. It might be worth checking out that site to see how your idea differs.

</comment><comment><USER4> I don't use the favourites feature at all, but I might use them more if there was some additional benefit beyond 'bookmarking' them.

</comment><comment><USER5> I use them for the same reasons you use it.

</comment><comment><USER6> I use them as "Bookmark".</comment>


Firefox 18 Gets Support for Retina Display - <AUTHOR> http://browserfame.com/857/firefox-retina-display <comment><USER2> Can anyone with a retina display and the Firefox nightly check this test case for Canvas, please: <http://www.phoboslab.org/crap/backingstore/>

I hope they didn't screw it up as bad as Apple did with Safari: <http://www.phoboslab.org/log/2012/09/drawing-pixels-is-hard>

Edit: judging from some comments in the source, the Canvas element still uses a low resolution, so the test case should work as expected in any case.

<comment><USER3> I just tested this and unfortunately the test case doesn't pass on the nightly. I am seeing (252,40,252) instead of the (255,0,255).

<comment><USER4> Same here:

(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252), (252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0), (0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252), (252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0), (0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252), (252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0), (0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252), (252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),(252,40,252),(0,0,0),

Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.8; rv:18.0) Gecko/18.0 Firefox/18.0 as downloaded and installed just a few minutes ago.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> I wonder at what kind of resolution we will no longer need anti-aliasing. Did they provide any Retina screenshots with AA off? You'd think that with small enough of a pixel it would no longer be necessary.

<comment><USER6> There is no clear cut answer to that. Even at 10,000ppi you can still get visual artifacts without anti-aliasing. The problem is pixles are averaging a single point source over a 'full' pixel so with some patterns they can become vary sensitive to slight motions. Think chain link fence, all the pixels could be on the fence and it looks solid, or between them and it looks clear, and if your rotation it can swap between them.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> What is there in a higher-resolution display that actually needs software support from Mozilla?

<comment><USER8> Applications need to be 'retina aware' to actually get the full resolution, otherwise they are told the resolution is 1440x900 (this doesn't include fonts, and other system-rendered features, which the OS can always render at full resolution). The program icons also need to be shipped in a higher resolution.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> OT: When does HN upgrade it's voting arrows for Retina displays?

<comment><USER9> Preferably it would be CSS.

       .upArrow {
       width: 0;
       height: 0;
       border-left: 6px solid transparent;
       border-right: 6px solid transparent;
       border-bottom: 6px solid #828282;
       }

<comment><USER4> CSS is fine with me. On the desktop, we could even replace the non-Retina arrows with own CSS and images, however, Safari on iOS doesn't offer this possibility.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> So do Retina apps mean we now have to deal with larger software packages, even if we don't have retina displays?

<comment><USER4> I guess so, same as on iOS devices. The example of iOS, however, shows that Retina will become the standard sooner or later … :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> I'm confused about this. I've been running the sept 11 Nightly and it has retina support. Did they take it out, and this is just about re-adding it?

Prior to that I used the "retinizer" app and the about:config hack to disable acceleration, but performance was really bad. Since running nightly, it has been fully retina enabled and smooth.

</comment><comment><USER12> About frickin' time. Firefox looks _horrible_ on retina Macbooks right now, to the point that it's unusable.

<comment><USER13> Relative term, and totally subjective. I have an rMBP, and use Firefox (as well as InDesign) all the time, and it's not horrible. If your entire screen looked that way, you wouldn't even notice.

<comment><USER12> Maybe yours does something that mine doesn't, but here's a screenshot: [http://cl.ly/image/2O2K1g411N3l/Screen%20Shot%202012-09-29%2...](http://cl.ly/image/2O2K1g411N3l/Screen%20Shot%202012-09-29%20at%208.52.31%20PM.png)

Left is Firefox, right is Chrome. Nothing special done to either. MBP is at the factory resolution. Very ironically, the screenshot at half-size looks better on my 24" Windows display than it does on the actual MBP does, presumably as Chrome is doing some resampling to downsize it. Look at it at full zoom to see what I mean.

I'm doing active web development on a number of browsers across a number of devices (Macs, Windows, iOS, Android), and Firefox on the Mac is easily the worst of the lot, by a rather large margin. I would easily notice if the whole screen looked like it - text is blurry and awfully aliased, to the point that it's jarring to read. I spend most of my time on Windows, which by most accounts has less beautiful text rendering than OS X, and switching over to Firefox on the rMBP feels just awful.

Given that I spend 99% of my day looking at a 94 DPI screen, I don't think it's too much to ask that the same application on my 220 DPI display not look like I'm playing Minecraft.

<comment><USER14> For me both windows look almost the same. And definitely Firefox is not "unusable" from this single screenshot.

Could you write more what is wrong with firefox on this screenshot?

<comment><USER15> The text is fuzzy and blurry. You may not see it if you don't zoom in (to 100%), because your browser will apply crappy resizing filters to the whole image, so both browsers will have the same look.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> This is fabulous, now if I could get it for the iPad, tell it to lie about what kind of device I was so that I would not be stuck with the 'mobile' version of Gmail. That would be a usability win.

<comment><USER17> Gmail's mobile version has links at the bottom: 'View Gmail in: Mobile | Older version | desktop'

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Why do you need "support" for a screen resolution? PC's have had different screen resolutions forever, why were there never news articles about "Firefox Gets Support For 1280x1024" or "Firefox Gets Support For 1920x1200"?

<comment><USER19> 1920x1200 does not equal high dpi. Think 1920x1200 on a 10" display. If your app runs on a high DPI screen, and the OS and your app has no support for this, all fonts and UI elements become tiny, which is unacceptable.

Windows XP had abysmal support for high DPI which usually resulted in broken UI layout. Vista introduced "DPI virtualization" requiring you to declare and provide explicit support for variable dpi in your application. Otherwise it is run at 96 DPI and raster scaling is applied. This prevents any UI layout issues but results in a a blurry image. I guess Apple uses the same approach: if your app has no explicit support, it runs under raster scaling.

</comment></comment><comment> mh- yeah, no. Just downloaded it.

<http://i.imgur.com/pbGvv.png>

whole thing looks like this.

<comment><USER20> Has it been fully implemented? The bug says that it's resolved.

<https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=674373>

<comment><USER21> In Mozilla's bug workflow, RESOLVED FIXED means the fix has been checked into Firefox's Mercurial trunk (the "mozilla-central" branch), but the fix won't be available for testing until the next Nightly build. VERIFIED FIXED means QA has tested the Nightly build and confirmed the bug has been fixed.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> Firefox is at v18? Last I knew it was at v5. Guess they didn't waste any time in their quest to catch up with Chrome.

<comment><USER23> That joke never gets old, let's keep saying it every time a Chrome or Firefox version comes out! (Or like here, just because a Chrome or Firefox version number was mentioned in a random article.)

<comment><USER24> Joke aside, this whole rapid release thing is irritating when it requires me to restart my browser all the time.

<comment><USER23> No browser AFAIK has the ability to patch a running process (it's very hard to do in general, but there are some ways to do it to a linux kernel for example). So you must restart to actually run the downloaded updates. Which means until you restart, you are running an unpatched browser which might have known exploits.

<comment><USER25> If each tab is a separate process, they could be upgraded one by one. You could even signal to each tab that it should open all links in a new process. Browsers are probably the app you could most easily transparently upgrade.

<comment><USER26> Not correct. Multiprocess browsers like Chrome don't actually run an entire browser in each process (that isn't realistically possible) because the individual tabs need to collaborate for the proper functioning of things like caches, cookies, etc.

<comment><USER25> If. If I can restart a web server without restarting memcache and have a new process handle new requests while the old process handles existing requests, it's clearly possible for a browser to change its rendering engine for new tabs.

<comment><USER27> The rendering engine, sure, but what about the rest of the browser? Cache, Cookie, Prefs, bookmarks, etc.

Browsers are not just rendering engines.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Palantir CEO Says Data-Mining Company Is Positioned to Go Public - <AUTHOR> http://www.wsj.com/articles/palantir-ceo-says-company-is-being-positioned-to-go-public-1477498155 <comment><USER2> I'm curious about how Palantir works as a public company. It has always looked like a data-centric McKinsey clone to me, and those kinds of consulting companies are usually partnerships.

Granted, Goldman Sachs and other investment banks that were once partnerships are now public. But that move hasn't necessarily been a good thing for the companies in question, and some argue it has been damaging.

Basically, Palantir looks to me like a law firm/consultancy, those firms typically find it advantageous to stay private, what is the advantage for Palantir to go public except to provide a cash out to investors?

<comment><USER3> They have made buckets of dough at the height of American surveillance activity and now they want to cash out while the getting is good.

<comment><USER4> What indication do you have that the surveillance state will shrink in the near future?

<comment><USER3> It doesn't have to shrink for Palantir to lose share to newcomers in a growing industry.

<comment><USER5> Or for certain classes of their customers (maybe governments?) to develop in- house solutions that become "good enough" that they expect to lose those customers in the future.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I'm curious if going public would lead to more transparency about what they do and for whom. Enron was famously opaque to its own investors until it was too late, but I would hope that public companies have greater requirements for transparency nowadays.

<comment><USER7> I don't think that Palantir being a public company would necessarily give the kind of insight into what they do to satisfy our curiosity. As far as I understand, Palantir could be very financially transparent while still keeping mum about who their clients are and what they are doing for them.

I think it's worth remembering that Enron was public.

<comment><USER8> I agree with you on the whole, but Enron was pre Sarbanes-Oxley which initiated a raft of reporting requirements on companies, so Enron is often a poor comparison to the present day.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarbanes%E2%80%93Oxley_Act](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarbanes%E2%80%93Oxley_Act)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> Main takeaway from that article - Alex Karp is a really odd guy.

<comment><USER10> You should watch his interview with Charlie Rose.

He's not your usual corporate leader, but there's an unmistakable intellect in the way he articulates himself which must work for both leading this particular workforce as well as selling to this particular customer base.

</comment></comment><comment><USER11> Anybody with first-hand knowledge able to explain to me the difference between Acxiom[1] and Palantir in the grand scheme of things?

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/technology/acxiom-the- quie...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/technology/acxiom-the-quiet-giant- of-consumer-database-marketing.html?_r=0)

<comment><USER12> Palantir doesn't own any data whatsoever. It is in no way a data mining company, which makes it strange that it's constantly referred to as such. It makes software to allow organizations to do analysis on their own data, which Palantir has varying degrees of access to.

Another crucial difference is that marketing is a tertiary use case for Palantir, at best.

</comment></comment><comment> a-no-n "Government (political), law-enforcement and security agency software company whom happens to use data-mining"

Perhaps this is shaking the trees of institutional/sovereign wealth funds/investors is in order to make them seem like they'll miss out.

IPO, these days, is a move of desperation and often a murdering of remaining agility.

</comment><comment><USER13> Is Palantir a "Data-Mining Company" or is a military, law enforcement and surveillance company?

<comment><USER14> You could define Palantir more easily by which customers buy its products (Nat sec/law enforcement/military intelligence), and who specifically in those organisations use their software (mostly intelligence analysts.)

By saying they are a "Data-Mining Company" is an obvious (to me) sign that they want to be able to position themselves in the public sector (e.g. banking, retail) with counter-fraud services/solutions, and perhaps more generic cyber security solutions for large organisations.

<comment><USER15> Palantir has been deployed into banks for years.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER16> Can someone shed some light on the asian claim? Seems like a really weird thing:

a) to bring up at all b) to bring up in an article about ipo

what does it have to do with the company going public?

<comment><USER17> I will shed light on the fact that at one point over 70% of my team were extremely bright and talented Asians and South Indians.

<comment><USER18> $10 says 'throaway0xff' is, in fact, Alex Karp himself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> _Palantir's workers "need to know they will have liquidity at a fair price," said Mr. Karp_

Unless there's a subtlety I missed, isn't this more likely to be driven by their VCs?

<comment><USER20> It sounds like the IPO is employee retention driven.

<comment><USER19> They're famous for underpaying and overworking, which I supposed could affect hiring, but yeah, maybe the subtlety is that employees were carrot-and- stick'ed with promises of IPO and now word has got around about work conditions there. Still, it's usually because VCs want their payday.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> > saying he is focused on customers who can promise accounts worth at least > $100 million.

What!?! Is there a market for that? Who pays that much? Republic of Turkey Secret Police?

<comment><USER17> Yes - there is a market. Legitimate companies that make things you use and ride in every day.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> And here comes the paywall.

Can't read it from direct link, can't read it from web link, can't read it from private browsing.

:-(

<comment><USER23> Copy the title of the article then put it in a google search and click on the first result. You should be able to bypass the paywall.

<comment><USER24> That's what the web link does, that user5994461 said they tried.

<comment><USER23> Close the paywall ad by clicking the x on the top right corner and it lets you read the article.

<comment><USER25> Try web link + incognito / private mode?</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


SaaS delivers return before investment - <AUTHOR> http://blogs.zdnet.com/SAAS/?p=618

<comment><USER2> Selling Business Intelligence software is very complicated because you need to communicate the benefits of the application in the context of the customers business processes. And businesses frequently set up their own processes to be unique. So they sales call and data gathering is pretty much a requirement.

But if your selling something like a simple SaaS application then it doesn't require the long process, and a 30-day trial is probably better suited. Or possibly just offer trials for each vertical industry, so its pretailored to the customer.

</comment><comment><USER3> So the solution to selling confusing software is a sales call. That's a novel idea worth exploring.

</comment><comment><USER4> I worked for a company like that. They had a whole department dedicated to analyzing customer (or rather, prospective customers) data and feeding it into a system to generate metrics of how much the company's product could save for the prospective customer.

Only trouble was, they did not charge for this, and often times failed to close the deal, and the entire operation just became a drag on profitability.

Were I the CEO of this company, I'd fire whoever came up with this scheme. If the company were based in, say, some heathen place in sub-Saharan Africa, I'd hire a tribe of native barbarians to stone his children for good measure.

(Yeah, I feel strongly about this one!)</comment>


Army ants' 'living' bridges suggest collective intelligence - <AUTHOR> http://www.kurzweilai.net/army-ants-living-bridges-suggest-collective-intelligence?utm_source=KurzweilAI+Daily+Newsletter&utm_campaign=45825ca8c5-UA-946742-1&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_6de721fb33-45825ca8c5-281895037 <comment><USER2> The world of social insects is filled with ideas for tackling resource tradeoffs of this sort. These are usually not signs of "collective intelligence", as much as they are a manifestation of good algorithm design, honed by aeons of evolution. In fact, we've successfully pinched and applied quite a few social insect resource tradeoff algorithms in computer science.

It's a marvel that we can actually understand these biological algorithms well enough to code them up. I wrote about an example of this in a blog post about EO Wilson's "Superorganisms" a while ago ([http://corte.si/posts/books/superorganism/index.html](http://corte.si/posts/books/superorganism/index.html)). Bee hives need to find the right balance between foragers out in the field, and nectar producers staying home to work in the hive. They have an elegant way of doing this, that works even when each bee can only rely on local knowledge - that is, each bee makes a decision about what it can see around itself, without any global integrative intelligence required. The algorithm goes like this (see the blog post for more detail):

1 - Not enough nectar collectors in the field? If yes, and you also have immediate knowledge of a producing flower patch, perform the waggle dance.

2 - Is the flower patch rich or the weather fine or the day early or does the colony need substantially more food? Perform the dance with appropriately greater vivacity and persistence.

3 - Not enough active foragers to send into the field? Perform the shaking maneuver.

4 - Not enough nectar processors in the hive to handle the nectar inflow? Perform the tremble dance.

A variant of this algorithm, directly inspired by bees, has been used to balance resource allocation in server farms:

[http://www2.isye.gatech.edu/~ctovey/publications/papers/bee....](http://www2.isye.gatech.edu/~ctovey/publications/papers/bee.oct19.2004.masi2.pdf)

<comment><USER3> > not signs of "collective intelligence", as much as they are a manifestation > of good algorithm design, honed by aeons of evolution.

What is intelligence, if not that?

<comment><USER2> Intelligence is the wrong word in this case. These are complicated emergent behaviours that arise from extremely simple rules applied locally and iteratively by each individual. There's no planning, forethought, or central driving will at play here.

If this is intelligence, then so is bone growth, which follows a similarly simple algorithm, is also honed by evolution, and is also inspiring real-world applications, e.g.:

[http://www.engineering.com/DesignSoftware/DesignSoftwareArti...](http://www.engineering.com/DesignSoftware/DesignSoftwareArticles/ArticleID/10279/Conceptual- Design-Inspired-by-Bone-Growth.aspx)

[https://www.fastcodesign.com/1671102/a-3-d-printed-house- tha...](https://www.fastcodesign.com/1671102/a-3-d-printed-house-that-grows- like-human-bone)

<comment><USER4> _There 's no planning, forethought, or central driving will at play here._

Do there have to be these things to show intelligence? Simple markets without central planning absolutely destroy central planning in terms of efficiency:

[http://www.realussr.com/ussr/queues/](http://www.realussr.com/ussr/queues/)

Maybe the intelligent, planning, ants were overtaken by the unintelligent ants :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> An organism is already an example of collective intelligence. Gene Regulatory Networks (GRNs) have the same mathematical description as a Artificial Neural Network (ANN). Each cell carries the same network topology and each network is linked to neighboring cells by cell-cell communication mechanism. The result is a large meta-network that controls growth and development and physiology. Some of these cells are neurons which are connected together in a new way and form a higher order network. In turn, so-called supra organisms are just neural networks which are connected to other neural networks through sensory signaling mechanisms. It's neural networks all the way down.

</comment><comment><USER6> I heard ants explained this way once: the little bug is not an ant. The colony is one ant.

<comment><USER7> I like to abuse plurals to say this:

The little bug is one ant. The colony is not "some ants" or "a bunch of ants"; it is _an ants_.

Similarly, you have one bee, and then you have a bees. (Though there are also species of solitary bees that don't form hives, so if you have a bunch of them in the same area then you do indeed have some bees there rather than a bees.)</comment></comment>


Recommended Tech Startup Lawyer and CPA in Bay Area? - <AUTHOR>

We are thinking about incorporating a subsidiary for our startup (exvo.com) in the USA.
Can any one recommend a good startup lawyer and CPA?
Thanks! <comment><USER2> Walker Corporate Law is always advertising on Mixergy. <http://walkercorporatelaw.com/>

<comment><AUTHOR> That seems a very good referral. I love the fixed price vision they express. Thanks a lot!! Anyone for a CPA that has comparable ethos?</comment></comment>


Why so many programming languages to write essentially the same programs? - <AUTHOR> http://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1jk4jo/eli5_why_are_there_so_many_programming_languages/

<comment><USER2> For better or worse, Reddit already has the discussion on this topic.

<comment><USER3> The top comment is even relatively insightful.</comment></comment>


Ask HN: Corporate Travel for Small Businesses? - <AUTHOR>

Hi everyone,<p>We are a small business but occasionally have to do some travel (no more than maybe 10-20 flights and stays a year). Obviously where possible we want to minimise our costs. Can anyone recommend good and easy corporate travel agents for such a small businesses? (We are based in London but often have to travel to the USA/EU)<p>-Thanks. <comment><USER2> Hi secfirstmd,

Have you had a chance to look at concur?

[https://www.concur.com/en-us/resource-center/small- business](https://www.concur.com/en-us/resource-center/small-business)

[https://www.concur.com/en-us/pricing- editions?icid=en_us_h-t...](https://www.concur.com/en-us/pricing- editions?icid=en_us_h-topnav_pricingeds-products)

We use it at my bank and it works fine (considering we are still on Windows XP and Outlook 2003, I'm guessing Concur was so good that we decided to upgrade to that).</comment>


Google's brilliant plan to get millions to adopt its e-money system: Gmail - <AUTHOR> http://qz.com/191496/googles-brilliant-plan-to-get-millions-to-adopt-its-e-money-system-gmail/

<comment><USER2> That reminds me....

Google's brilliant plan to get millions to adopt its _social network_ platform: Gmail</comment>


Edward Snowden and China - <AUTHOR> http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/tinker_tailor_snowden_spy_4QskMf6BOq6VmZU3oXItQM

<comment><USER2> -1000 parroting sycophant empty echo-chamber plastic bobbing head nodder. Reading HN posts last week touched on far more questions and controversies then this writer's twenty minutes of superficial and bent rehashed googling.

</comment><comment><USER3> I'll give a +1 just for the title of the article "Tinker tailor Snowden spy"</comment>


Brazil protests spread in Sao Paulo, Brasilia and Rio - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-22946736 <comment><USER3> Brazilian citizen here, but living in the US. I never thought I'd say this, but I really wish I was back there to take part in the protests. Brazil finally has a chance to change for the better.

For those of you who don't know what's going on, or who are being fed incorrect information by the media: protests started because of a small increase in bus fares, but that was just the trigger to the whole thing. Brazilians are fed up with all the crap the government has been doing for decades, unscrupulously stealing tax payers' money for their own benefit. Many will say this happens everywhere, even in the most developed countries, but people from developed countries usually have no idea and can barely picture how rampant corruption is in Brazil.

Brazil is not a poor country. It's one of the biggest economies in the world. But if you go down there, it will pretty much look like a poor country. Despite the strong economy and the ridiculously high taxes, there is very little income redistribution. Besides the income inequality, another thing that piss Brazilians off is the fact that everything has to be paid in double: you pay taxes for public education (even the university is free), but it's so shitty you have to pay for a private school for your kids; you pay taxes for the universal health care system, but it's so shitty (dozens of people die on the line for life-critical procedures) you have to pay for private health care (which is usually shitty too, but not nearly as shitty as the public one); you supposedly pay taxes for public safety, but it's nonexistent to a point people have to leave behind gates (I had to go through 2 gates and 2 doors, with 5 keys in total, to enter my aparment there) and bared windows and pay for private security companies to secure their homes.

Brazilians have had enough. The current generation of youths is much more connected and aware of the country's problems, and usually have a much better idea that the situation outside (read US, Canada, Europe and Australia, popular destinations for studying or working abroad) is better and that a better life is possible, and it won't take it anymore. It's finally time for a change.

<comment><USER4> The so called leaders of the original movement (against the raise in the bus fares) were on an interview today and negated that the protests are because "Brazilians had enough" though. [1] They said that even though all the people are commenting on their Facebook profile for days that it's not about the bus fares anymore.

The people on the protests are already being manipulated by the original movement, by left wing and right wing. Even the mass media and Internet celebrities are capitalizing on it, each claiming the protests to be whatever they feel like. The swing on the public opinion between last monday and today is so severe that it is scary, a clear study in group dynamics.

Without an objective, this is more like a massive flashmob than a real movement. It's also a catastrophe waiting to occur, all it takes is one radical leadership to pop up.

I hope the people get more critic or this won't achieve anything meaningful, will just fulfill the ego of the people who went to the protests to have an Instagram pic of it on their profile.

[1] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXxQ6ntyM-U&feature=c4-overvi...](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXxQ6ntyM-U&feature=c4-overview)

<comment><USER3> At least there at thousands of people out there, and the government can see they won't have it forever. I guess that's the main point of it. It doesn't matter if the protests started for a reason and turned into something else. People are fed up, period. They are going out there to express their contempt for one of the world's most abusive and corrupt governments.

Some are saying they are going to invade the National Congress. I really hope they do.

<comment><USER5> Brazilian Living in Australia here. I hope they do too and kick Renan Calheiros out of it... he so deserves it.

A convicted criminal being the president of a Chamber that represents the people is one of the biggest shames of our country right now, at least for me.

<comment><USER6> Unfortunately, he is not the only problem here. It will be a good thing if it happen, but does not solve the huge problem we have in Brazil. The Chamber is just a sample of our society, the corruption is everywhere.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> The police aggression is getting ridiculous.

My university is right next to a soccer stadium holding a Confederation's Cup game. Since the effect of these and other upcoming sporting events on public works is a major cause of vindication, a large group of protesters tried to move near the stadium and ended up clashing with riot troops. I was at one of entrances into campus, when police started throwing tear gas and shooting rubber bullets almost indiscriminately while yelling that anybody who stayed was going to get beaten.

</comment><comment><USER4> I just hope the mass doesn't get manipulated into doing anything stupid, because the attempts already started.

Left-wing sympathizers (including the original movement) are already manipulating the protests. A portion of the people in the protests diverged and tried to break into the state hall (where the governor sleeps). Why, if the bus fares are controlled by the city mayor? They should be protesting on the city hall, but they won't, for obvious political implications since the mayor is left-wing.

Right-wing are also joining the protests now in an attempt to overthrow. The anti-corruption sentiment of the general population can be fuel to an impeachment of left-wings in power in the following days.

The media at large is also reporting the happenings in a positive light only. We all know this can't be good, a functional media is one that shows two sides of the story, but it seems most media outlets are too scared to disagree.

Finally, the moral judgment already started on the social networks. Anyone who doesn't join the protests gets alienated. Since social networks amplify positive feedback only, things are turning into an echo chamber.

Different than other brazilians, I'm not 100% happy the "people are waking up", I'm actually scared because it's just a bunch of fed up people hitting the streets without a clear objective.

This has the potential to be really good if the people put political parties aside and keep putting pressure on important matters in the following days; but can also be catastrophically bad if radical leaderships pop up from this.

<comment><USER8> Haddad is not left-wing. PT is not left-wing.

They marched to the state hall because Alckimin (São Paulo governor) has the control over the military police (yes, our everyday police is military), and after the brutality of 06/13 it seemed only logical.

<comment><USER9> Care to explain why you don't consider Haddad and PT (the Workers Party) leftists? I totally disagree.

<comment><USER10> they WERE left before PT and Lula get into power.. after that PT and Lula is much more like center.. not quite left, not quite right..

For America and UK they may look left, but thats because they just have rightists.. and maintain the other moviments choked and without any voice..

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> Another point of view on the protests: [http://abrazilianoperatinginthisarea.wordpress.com/2013/06/1...](http://abrazilianoperatinginthisarea.wordpress.com/2013/06/16/brazilian- protests-explained-its-not-the-economy-stupid/)

This started because of a raise in bus fares, but the fact that more and more people are protesting has a lot to do with police brutality in repressing the first protests.

Most people in Brazil don't usually protest (nor actually fill complains when wronged), due to a variety of reasons.

But whenever there is a protest it is quickly classified into either: a) "just vandalism", or b) "peaceful protests".

For what the media/elite calls as 'a)', the typical Brazilian attitude is quite weird. Most people in Brazil have this very fascist view that police should be brutal with "criminals". Whoever they might be. As long as not themselves.

However, for the rarer cases where 'b)' happens (and is viewed as such by most people), which was the case here, it might be different. In the current case, police brutality backfired and became one of the main reasons for the escalation of protests and its spread to other cities.

PS: I'm a Brazilian citizen.

</comment><comment><USER12> The protesters passed by my street on the way to Paulista Avenue, and I have to admit that seeing all those people walking singing the national anthem was simply amazing. Something to tell my grandsons :)

Last number I heard on the TV reported 75K people in Sao Paulo, though the authorities told the media that would announce the updated numbers only after the protests.

The movement leaders have already created a new event on FaceBook, calling all protesters to gather together again tomorrow, at 5PM on Se Square.

</comment><comment><USER13> In Brazil especially it's far more important for these protests to materialize into organized political action and public debates. Overthrowing the government of Brazil would be unhelpful, Brazil has something approaching a functional democracy (certainly comparable to democracy in America during many parts of its history). That should not be thrown away. And with concerted political action it can be strengthened rather than weakened, as can liberty. I fear the temptation of the powerless to exercise power, even in the form of a violent mob, could outweigh the desire to fight for the deep, long-term changes that will actually see the country improve.

<comment><USER10> I dont think "America" is a good example of democracy.. Brazil is very sofisticated in terms of democracy than US is in many levels..

US economical development was in part because the industrial lords could do whatever they want without many concerns.. here we got more discussions about social aspects, and more people from diferent ways of views..

You see moviments like ocuppy were really choked by the mass media and the politics in the very beginning..

People who dares to face against the status quo get convicted as traitors, get killed or are invited to leave the country (Chaplin)

</comment></comment><comment><USER14> This is an excellent brief overview of the problems in Brazil:

\- No, I'm not going to the World Cup by @CarlaDauden

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZApBgNQgKPU](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZApBgNQgKPU)

</comment><comment><USER15> One funny detail about the article I couldn't help noticing: the article talks about "scaling the roof" of the National Congress building conjuring up an image of the people swarming over and laying siege to some kind of national fortress. But of course the National Congress rooftop[1] is one of the most accessible rooftops in the world being at road-level and visited by thousands of tourists on a regular basis.

1\. [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brasilia_National_Co...](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Brasilia_National_Congress.JPG)

</comment><comment><USER16> I am really proud to see this here. I was there and I can say that it was the largest demonstration since the military dictatorship era more than 20 year ago.

<comment><USER5> What about Color impeachement ? I think that one was bigger...

<comment><USER10> Yeah, but in that time(90's) it was manipulated by the mass media.. now its a real democratic movement from the people..

And now with the media astonished because they cant control anybody anymore

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I'm Brazilian and Carioca... I was at Rio's protest yesterday and it was BEAUTIFUL.

I'm against all kind of violence and vandalism, unfortunatelly we had a few people that caused a LOT of damage to the city in the very end, but almost every story you hear about manifestations and protests ends the same way everywhere in the world... so I leave for each one what you feel about this.

We are just sick of swallowing all the sh*t and public abuses that Government throw at us and we just complain in silence, this time people went to the streets and showed that if we manage to organize ourselves and keep pushing (peacefully, of course), we might achieve something meaningful... like, for instance, RESPECT.

Send love and support to us, we are needing. :)

</comment><comment><USER18> it had to start somewhere

it had to start sometime

<comment><USER19> what better place than here

what better time than now

<comment><USER8> It would be a lot better if it happened before Brazil decision to host the world cup and olympics.

Theres nothing much that can be done now.

<comment><USER20> It took me two year to know we would be hosting the world cup

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> What does this have to do with Hacker News? From the guidelines:

> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're > evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or > disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's > probably off-topic.

<comment><USER22> Keep. Reading.

> Please don't submit comments complaining that a submission is inappropriate > for the site. If you think something is spam or offtopic, flag it by going > to its page and clicking on the "flag" link.

<comment><USER21> What are the disadvantages to complaining in the actual thread? I understand about making new submissions for the sake of complaining.

<comment><USER23> Because it always results in the same exchange of dialogue. If you don't think a post is appropriate, flag it. That does something that might result in action. All commenting does is consume space for nowt.

<comment><USER24> Commenting also lets people know that a post - like this one - <USER2> inappropriate for the site.

<comment><USER21> Well, that was my motivation. It's been on the front page for 6 hours now. Obviously the flagging system is broken for popular off-topic submissions. (We are all in agreement that this submission is flagrantly off-topic, right?)

<comment><USER8> No it's not. Don't you think it would be on-topic if this was happening in the USA?

I remember very well all the coverage here about the occupy movement.

So just because it doesn't affect your ass directly doesn't mean it is off- topic.

Edit: Same thing as all the Turkey Riot threads. Did you comment against every one of them?

<comment><USER24> > No it's not. Don't you think it would be on-topic if this was happening in > the USA?

No. It's about politics, and in the mainstream news.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Outsourcing mobile client dev - <AUTHOR>

hi gang,
i'm working on a project for the mobile space.  there are two pieces.  smartphone client and server backend.  the backend is where all the magic happens and that's what i'm currently focused on.  the front end is essential, but I have limited time/resources to work on iphone/android/blackberry apps AND the backend stuff.
i've read a few threads here on HN about outsourcing and what a nightmare it can be.
I'm curious to know:
-if anyone is in the same boat as me -if you are, how you're solving that problem -whether outsourcing is still a nightmare -any suggestions on where to find good, short term (which could turn into long term if we get along), reasonably priced mobile app development.
cheers,
oddboy <comment><USER2> Outsourcing isn't so bad, but you do have to be careful. I'd recommend against going with anyone who isn't doing the actual development (i.e. someone who hires other specialized people to do the actual work).

I only have two experiences with outsourcing so far, and that was the case for my first time. He emailed me shortly after "starting" the project, saying that development had stopped and that he was looking for a developer to replace the last one. More emails with more excuses followed, taking up the original time- frame for the project, and then he just stopped emailing entirely.

So, if you get the slightest hint that the person you're talking to wouldn't be able to get the job done if a staff member leaves, then go with someone else.

If, however, you manage to find a good developer/team that has either has a strong portfolio, or enough successfully completed projects (on a site like <http://rentacoder.com> [aka <http://vworker.com]>), then you shouldn't have a problem.

Just do a bit of upfront research on the person/people before committing to anything. Make sure you feel comfortable in their ability to get the work done, backing that up with data of some sort, and you should be fine to outsource.

</comment><comment><USER3> I have the same problem as you. I'm currently developing the backend and mobile apps (android only), I try to choose tools that allow me to develop as fast as I can (right now, I'm using the combo: android + appengine (python). Tell me how it goes for you :) and good luck

</comment><comment><USER4> I could potentially help you, I run a boutique mobile dev company <http://www.mokriya.com>, but our rates aren't comparable to outsourcing firms, since we are based in US. My contact info is in my profile, if you want to contact.

I think the secret to success with getting outsourced work done properly is constant communication. Make them upload the work weekly to a github account. If you engage someone and he/she hasn't produced anything for more than 2 to 3 weeks, he is unlikely to produce anything in the future.

</comment><comment><USER5> Of course you can go about outsourcing in many different ways. We've been baldy burnt with some freelancers and others have been a real blessing. I recently wrote a long history of developing an Outlook plugin here: <http://24waystostart.com/2010/frog-driven-development/>

I find though that nothing beats being on location with developers in the same room while working on a project. Find someone close by or at least willing to start off the project together on location.

</comment><comment><USER6> I'm a freelance mobile developer that works together with a great front end developer. We mainly develop iOS and Android applications.

You can see some of our work at <http://kuugu.com/>. I also have a list of projects that I've worked on alone -- both professional & personal. Send me an email at firstname.lastname@example.com if you're interested or want to have a chat.

</comment><comment><USER7> I would suggest you spec out the project exactly how it should be delivered. Plenty of time I see people starting projects with our a complete idea of what should be delivered or even worse have too much feature creep.

Also set milestones that are connected with payments so that you do not get the "delay game".

</comment><comment><USER8> Maybe I could help. I've been working on mobile dev last couple of years (iPhone/J2ME) remotely from Argentina. Email me if you're interested.

</comment><comment><USER9> Oddboy you may be able to use one of the cross-platform mobile frameworks thus redcuing your mobile client dev time some of them are:

Rhomobile PhoneGap QuickConnect</comment>


Ask HN: If you had leave your current job, what would you chose to do? - <AUTHOR> As in, a job that you would do if you wanted to take a break from programming for awhile - so the main criteria are:<p>1) Fun (to you) 2) Little to no training required <comment><USER2> Content creator

I know model airplanes are toys but I loved designing/building/piloting them. Making videos... requires money, transportation, property, hardware... but it's great. Open field, blue sky, green grass...

That's one of those things where for me I'm not wondering what content/how to produce it. That would just flow out of passion. Before the problem was I couldn't build websites now I'm a "full stack pretender" so... I just gotta wait for my life to align... (quit being a peasant).

Also just building stuff in general, tinkering... build a vertical wind turbine with a telephone pole that would be neat like a spinning inverted helical onion profile. Don't know if it would be a good design but it would be neat.

edit: oh little to no training required, yeah I built planes for like 6 years... I'm a scratchuilder... hotwire cut, fiberglass, 2 degree washout, 250w/lb that's a fun plane</comment>


Ask HN: What JavaScript library/framework can I use to build simple Web UI? - <AUTHOR> I want to build Web UI for a simple REST backend. It is a side-project and so doesn't have to look super polished: a couple of pages with sortable lists + few forms and buttons to insert/update items. Basic user auth. What is the simple and quick way to build something like this?
I am not a UI dev. Last UI I needed was built in Delphi 5 :-) I don't really have desire to spend months on learning HTML5, CSS3, Photoshop, and reviewing hundreds of frameworks and libs. Just need to build something decent-looking and move onto other things. <comment><USER2> Bootstrap + a template.</comment>


Ask HN: Does coding style really matter? - <AUTHOR>

<comment><USER2> That's a vague question.

You could mean the style of the architecture of the code, and how easy it is to find the bit that you want to fix/extend.

You could mean how adaptable is the code, is it loosely coupled enough that when you grow and find a bottleneck, that the bottleneck can be addressed without enormous changes rippling through the codebase.

You could simply mean the whitespace, variable names, and very basic structure of a file, and whether it takes minutes for a new maintainer to comprehend a file unknown to them or hours (and it really matters when it's a critical bug that needs resolving).

You can already see from my attempting to understand the question, that one way or the other it does have an impact.

Is style more important than shipping? No. A shipped product with poor style beats the most elegant code base that never shipped or shipped so late that you missed an opportunity.

But bad style (however you define it) can contribute greatly to technical debt which may really hurt you later.

</comment><comment><USER3> Does coding style affect the bug rate? Yes. So it matters.

For example, in the world before compiled had warnings for this sort of thing, putting the constant to the left side of the equality operator in a conditional reduced the chances of accidentally making it an assignment operator.

Also, the bug rate is reduced the more code you can fit onto a screen without having to scroll. Coding styles that waste fewer lines probably reduce the bug rate.</comment>


There Is No Magic - <AUTHOR> http://deconstructinggenius.wordpress.com/2011/04/22/there-is-no-magic/ <comment><USER3> The idea of genius and brilliance as something you earn, that is the combination of hard work, an open mind, the right mix of humility and hurbis, and the right circumstances, is a profound change in how we view our world.

I hope it's true, because we currently focus our resources and attention on those who are labelled "gifted" early on, instead of building on the idea of life as a constant process of re-imagination and education. If this is true, then there are geniuses the world over, and we just need to tap their potential.

 _"I am somehow less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein's brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops."_ \- Stephen Jay Gould

<comment><USER4> HN's founder, pg, has done something to promote this idea.

<http://www.paulgraham.com/hs.html>

"I'm not saying there's no such thing as genius. But if you're trying to choose between two theories and one gives you an excuse for being lazy, the other one is probably right."

It is indeed a good idea for people who are trying to solve hard problems not to ask, "How good is my ability?" but rather to ask, "What use am I making of all my ability and all my other resources to solve this problem?"

<comment><USER5> Agree! Another example of this that my old music teacher used to give all the time was John Coltrane. Everybody agrees that he was a great player, but he wasn't a prodigy. He was notorious for practicing day and night to continue improving his craft.

Even Miles Davis thought he was a bit boring because all he (John) wanted to do was practice. :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> In science, as well as in other fields of human endeavor, there are two kinds of geniuses: the "ordinary" and the "magicians." An ordinary genius is a fellow that you and I would be just as good as, if we were only many times better. There is no mystery as to how his mind works. Once we understand what he has done, we feel certain that we, too, could have done it. It is different with the magicians. They are, to use mathematical jargon, in the orthogonal complement of where we are and the working of their minds is for all intents and purposes incomprehensible. Even after we understand what they have done, the process by which they have done it is completely dark. They seldom, if ever, have students because they cannot be emulated and it must be terribly frustrating for a brilliant young mind to cope with the mysterious ways in which the magician's mind works. Richard Feynman is a magician of the highest caliber.

\--Mark Kac

I think it's probably best if we don't deify too many geniuses, but I think it's fair to say that there are a handful in history where, even had we been exposed to all of the diverse experiences they had, we still wouldn't hope to equal.

<comment><USER7> The impression I got on reading Feynman's "Surely You're Joke...", was that Feynman was a magician in the ordinary sense of the word; he liked to produce results in a fashion that was maximally dramatic and maximally inexplicable (whether those results involved opening safes or calculating complex formulas).

And consider. The first sleight-of-hand magicians were village shamans who used the wonder the "magic" produced to leverage the power of suggestion for healing. But we know that the effect of superstition on society as a whole is detrimental.

Similarly, the belief that Feynman really had "magic" ways to unlock safes or solve math problems is less-than-useful.

Edit: I think that it is true that some fraction of scientists operate as "magicians" but some of this can come from a remarkably selfish position - <USER2> desire maintain their colleagues in awe and ignorance. I don't think Feynman in particular was in this unfortunate category but I've seen some folks whose approach was basically abusive.

<comment><USER8> I read "Surely You're Joking..." and "What Do You Care..." with the idea that he's probably underselling himself.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> _Multiple studies have shown that beyond a certain point (around two to three standard deviations), further IQ is not particularly helpful._

Is this true? I'd wager that the average IQ of top-rank mathematicians (say, the top 100 as judged by their peers) is _at least_ three standard deviations above the mean, and more likely closer to 4. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if the average IQ of said group is well over 160.

<comment><USER4> _Is this true?_

You are to be commended for asking whether the statement is true. I'd like to check that author's references, but I have reason to believe that he is on the right track.

 _I'd wager that the average IQ of top-rank mathematicians (say, the top 100 as judged by their peers) is at least three standard deviations above the mean, and more likely closer to 4._

You have indicated your view of the sources you have read by proposing a wager. I'll gladly stake a large amount of money on that wager, because you would surely lose. There have already been studies of the issue, after all. Definitional problems here for settling the wager among you, me, and our seconds would include defining just who the top 100 mathematicians are (I'd expect a lot of debate on that point), and which brand of IQ test should be taken to be the most definitive, as each IQ test battery disagrees with each other IQ test battery. But I have no doubt I would win the bet.

For one thing, four standard deviations above the population median (IQ score of 160 by current standard scoring conventions) is the very peak of reliable scoring on any currently normed brand of IQ test. Commenting on the higher numerical scores found in the scoring tables of the obsolete Stanford-Binet Form L-M IQ test, Christoph Perleth, Tanja Schatz, and Franz J. Mönks (2000) comment that "norm tables that provide you with such extreme values are constructed on the basis of random extrapolation and smoothing but not on the basis of empirical data of representative samples." "Early Identification of High Ability". In Heller, Kurt A.; Mönks, Franz J.; Sternberg, Robert J. et al.. International Handbook of Giftedness and Talent (2nd ed.). Amsterdam: Pergamon. p. 301. ISBN 978-0-08-043796-5. Lewis Terman recognized the core problem with IQ scores at the high end a long time ago:

"The reader should not lose sight of the fact that a test with even a high reliability yields scores which have an appreciable probable error. The probable error in terms of mental age is of course larger with older than with young children because of the increasing spread of mental age as we go from younger to older groups. For this reason it has been customary to express the P.E. [probable error] of a Binet score in terms of I.Q., since the spread of Binet I.Q.'s is fairly constant from age to age. However, when our correlation arrays [between Form L and Form M] were plotted for separate age groups they were all discovered to be distinctly fan-shaped. Figure 3 is typical of the arrays at every age level.

"From Figure 3 it becomes clear that the probable error of an I.Q. score is not a constant amount, but a variable which increases as I.Q. increases. It has frequently been noted in the literature that gifted subjects show greater I.Q. fluctuation than do clinical cases with low I.Q.'s . . . . we now see that this trend is inherent in the I.Q. technique itself, and might have been predicted on logical grounds." (Terman & Merrill, 1937, p. 44)

Alan S. Kaufman has a great discussion of error of estimation in IQ testing and variance in scores between one IQ test and another in his recent book IQ Testing 101. For much, much more on this issue, see

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:WeijiBaikeBianji/Intellige...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:WeijiBaikeBianji/IntelligenceCitations)

for further reading suggestions.

A quotation, from an interview with Stephen Hawking in the New York Times:

"Q: What is your I.Q.?

"A: I have no idea. People who boast about their I.Q. are losers."

<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/12/magazine/12QUESTIONS.html>

<comment><USER9> _I have no doubt I would win the bet._

Awesome. I love betting at ∞:1 odds. I wager $ε.

<comment><USER4> Here are just a few of the many results for an easy Google search:

<http://www.google.com/search?q=infinity+is+not+a+number>

<http://nrich.maths.org/2756>

(I particularly like this one, as the author is a top mathematician, here seen writing in her younger days.)

<http://mathforum.org/library/drmath/view/62486.html>

(Ask Dr. Math pages are generally good for answering elementary questions from students.)

[http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2008/10/infinity_is_not_a_n...](http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2008/10/infinity_is_not_a_number.php)

(Of course the Good Math, Bad Math blog has a page on this issue.)

<http://www.physicsforums.com/archive/index.php/t-65355.html>

(A discussion on Physics Forum illustrating how some of the confusions about infinity arise.)

<http://www.jimloy.com/algebra/two.htm>

(Jim Loy's page on this is interesting too.)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> There definitely _is_ Magic, at least as it's defined here.

This is plain to see in anyone who has worked with children. These kids are too young to have had very varied experiences, and they come from bad homes, good homes, and everything in between.

Yet, a very small percentage of them are an easy order of magnitude 'better' at understanding and communicating complex ideas.

There is no doubt that hard work, and smart work begets better brains.. but the idea that brilliance and genius is 'something you earn' just doesn't hold up when you look at kids.

<comment><USER11> The way I like to look at it is: even if I am not particularly smart, I am not going to let that fact get in the way of anything I wish to do [n]. I say don't underestimate the power of concept reframing, perspective changes, weaknesses leveraging, tenacity and plain not caring whether or not you are smart.

[n] So long as it is not stupid and without being stupid about it.

</comment></comment><comment><USER12> When I was young I sailed and raced dinghies and skiffs.

This is a fairly cerebral sport that usually requires a great working knowledge of the physics invovled in making boats with sails go fast.

Most of the champions I observed were really smart kids in other regards, but every so often I would see regatta winners that were not 'smart' people in any academic sense, but who had what appeared to have an inate ability to rig and sail a boat as fast as possible. This is not a trivial thing, and I am talking about people who would have likely failed a highschool level physics class on the same topic.

Is this a type of genius too?

</comment><comment><USER13> I generally agree with this, however it doesn't explain the "Rainman" aka Kim Peek, geniuses; this level of mental strength can't be gained purely from hard work.

<comment><USER14> Didn't he have savant syndrome - ie. his brain was wired differently than ours? I am not a neurologist, and I can't explain how his mind worked (I doubt if anyone can) - but I think that question 'how to gain mental abilities of Kim Peek' is similar to 'what can I do to get autism'. I know it sound harsh, I just want to say that you probably can't gain this kind of abilities from any amount of hard work.

<comment><USER13> Exactly, but autism doesn't excuse the fact that it is a humanly possible level of intellectual capacity.

<comment><USER14> Well, we don't know how many 'brain resources' does 'normal' skills that autistic people lack require - and in my opinion they may require as much computing power and memory as Kim Peek's genius skills. We don't know how much of our potential is spent on everyday tasks, like parsing converstaions with other people.

<comment><USER15> You seem to suggest that the brain is a zero sum game. It may be so, but it is a mere assumption.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


HN style commenting in Rails - 7 lines of code - <AUTHOR> http://github.com/aarongough/has_threaded_comments#readme

<comment><AUTHOR> Feedback and code contributions welcomed!</comment>


How Different Cultures Understand Time (2014) - <AUTHOR> http://www.businessinsider.com/how-different-cultures-understand-time-2014-5

<comment><USER2> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7838475](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7838475)</comment>